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KINGDOM TO HOST WORLD CONFERENCE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

Kingdom to Host World Conference on Human Rights
by M. Ghazanfar Ali Khan
Arab News Staff

www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=28245&d=2&m=7&y=2003

RIYADH, 2 July 2003 - Saudi Arabia will host an international conference on human rights on Oct. 14, the first conference of its kind to be organized with the help of the Saudi government.

The announcement comes against the background of steps in the Kingdom to set up two human rights commissions.

Saudi Red Crescent Society (SRCS) official Abdullah Al-Hazza, who is also the conference's secretary-general, said the event was being organized in cooperation with the Ministries of the Interior, Justice and Foreign Affairs.

Al-Hazza said a number of international organizations would participate in the conference, whose theme is "human rights at the time of peace and war."

The conference will also shed light on the Islamic approach toward human rights.

The SRCS official said invitations had been sent to many local and international organizations. A number of universities, the Shoura Council, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the King Faisal Foundation, the International Red Cross Society, the Muslim World League (MWL), the Italy-based International Institute for Human Rights and some UN organizations including UNESCO and UNICEF have been invited to attend.

The conference, the SRCS sources said, seeks to promote Islam as the religion of peace, tolerance and love. Islam is the first to acknowledge the rights of human being - a fact, which can be substantiated by historical evidence, they said.

 

TROUBLED KINGDOM

Troubled Kingdom
Saudis to host human-rights conference
U.N. invited to join event promoting Islam as religion of peace
WorldNetDaily.com
July 3, 2003

Despite its regard by Western nations as one of the world's most repressive regimes, Saudi Arabia is preparing to host its first international conference on human rights this fall, promoting Islam as a "religion of peace."

With a theme of "human rights at the time of peace and war," the conference will "shed light on the Islamic approach toward human rights," according to the Arab News, a government-approved daily.

Some United Nations organizations, including UNESCO and UNICEF, have been invited to the Oct. 14 event, the Saudi paper said. Others include the Muslim World League, International Red Cross Society, Organization of the Islamic Conference and the Italy-based International Institute for Human Rights.

Abdullah Al-Hazza, a Saudi Red Crescent Society official who also is the conference's secretary-general, said the event was being organized in cooperation with the Saudi Ministries of the Interior, Justice and Foreign Affairs.

Red Crescent officials told Arab News the conference seeks to promote Islam as the religion of peace, tolerance and love.

Islam is the first to acknowledge the rights of the human being - a fact, which can be substantiated by historical evidence, they said.

Nevertheless, the Western understanding of human rights is decidedly at odds.

In its most recent human-rights report, issued in March, the U.S. State Department said Saudi Arabia's Islamic government in 2002 "prohibited or restricted freedom of speech, the press, assembly, association, religion and movement."

The State Department's annual report on religious freedom says bluntly, "freedom of religion does not exist in Saudi Arabia."

In its May report, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom said "Saudi Arabia is a uniquely repressive case where the government forcefully and almost completely limits the public practice or expression of religion to one interpretation: a narrow and puritanical version of Islam based on the Wahhabi doctrine."

Consequently, the commission - an independent panel established by Congress - said, "those Saudis and foreign contract workers who do not adhere to the Saudi government's interpretation of Islam are subject to severe religious freedom violations."

Among the most serious abuses and forms of discrimination, according to the USCIRF, are:

• Virtually complete prohibitions on establishing non-Wahhabi places of worship, the public expression of non-Wahhabi religion, the wearing of non-prescribed religious dress and symbols, and the presence of identifiable clerics of any religion other than the government's interpretation of Islam;
• The harassment, detention, arrest, torture and subsequent deportation by government authorities of Christian foreign workers for worshipping in private - with many forced to go to great lengths to conceal private religious practice to avoid these abuses;
• The detention, imprisonment and, in some cases, torture of Shi'a clerics and religious scholars for their religious views, which differ from those of the government;
• The offensive and discriminatory language found in Saudi government-sponsored school textbooks, sermons in mosques and articles and commentary in the media about Jews, Christians and non-Wahhabi streams of Islam; and
• The interpretation and enforcement of religious law in Saudi Arabia, which affects every aspect of women's lives and results in serious violations of their human rights.

As WorldNetDaily reported, an American woman kidnapped by her Saudi father as a child sought refuge in the U.S. Consulate in Jeddah last month. She pleaded with U.S. officials to help her and her Saudi-born children, age 3 and 5, travel to America but was forced to leave the kingdom without them.

Saudi law dictates that no woman, American or not, can leave the country without permission of her husband or father.

The woman eventually fled the kingdom for the U.S., but left her children behind.

 

SAUDI LEADERS AGONIZE: WHERE DID WAHABISM GO WRONG?

Saudi leaders agonize: Where did Wahabism go wrong?
Special to WorldTribune.com
July 2, 2003

ABU DHABI - Saudi leaders are planning to revise the ruling Wahabi ideology said to have spawned Al Qaida and related insurgency movements.

On Tuesday, Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef Bin Abdul Aziz cited what he termed extremist ideas among young Saudis for the emergence of the Al Qaida network in the kingdom. Prince Nayef said these ideas have deviated from mainstream Islam and led to the attacks in Saudi Arabia, Middle East Newsline reported.

"Why are these things happenings?" Prince Nayef told the Shura Council on Tuesday. "What are the motives behind them? We need to ask: Did the source of this ideology come from this land or was it imported from outside?

Was it the result of fanatical ideas from people who have been brainwashed? Or is it a combination of factors, inside and out? But above all, how powerful is this ideology and how widespread is it?"

"They blame us for being Wahabis," Saudi Defense Minister Prince Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz told military commanders on Tuesday. "Everybody knows who was Mohammed Bin Abdul Wahab. He was a worldly man who studied Islamic culture in India, Pakistan and Egypt."

Nayef said the kingdom must focus on the beliefs and behavior of young Saudis. He said a government priority is to return these youngsters to what he termed the straight path of the Muslim nation.

"We have witnessed the criminal acts of some of our youth, who are citizens of this country," Nayef said. "They have killed people, destroyed property and terrorized families. If a person does something wrong and is convinced it is right, then we have to look at the root causes."

Saudi leaders said Al Qaida and related insurgency groups have distorted Wahabi beliefs and focused only on jihad. They said this has hurt both the domestic and foreign interests of the kingdom.

Western diplomatic sources said the Saudi royal family have discussed the prospect of removing elements of Wahabi doctrine taught in mosques and schools around the kingdom. They said Saudi security and intelligence agencies have concluded that Wahabi teachings were exploited to launch insurgency operations against the kingdom.

So far, up to 1,000 Saudi clerics regarded as being linked to Al Qaida have been either dismissed or restricted in their activities, the sources said. They said Riyad has also drafted regulations that would restrict the references to jihad, or holy war, in radio and television broadcasts.

Saudi officials, who have not denied the report, said at least 124 people were arrested in the kingdom since the May 12 suicide strikes by Al Qaida in Riyad. The suicide bombings against Western compounds killed 35 people, eight of them Americans.

Many of those arrested, the officials said, were minors who had been recruited by Al Qaida. They said in many cases the parents were either uninformed or pressured into allowing their children to help carry weapons or relay messages within the Al Qaida network.

Nayef said the recent crackdown of Al Qaida suspects included many foreign nationals. He said many of the suspects were under age 25 and appeared to have been brainwashed.

Saudi Arabia has also bolstered its security and intelligence apparatus. King Fahd appointed Prince Faisal Ibn Abdullah Bin Mohammed Al Saud as deputy national intelligence chief. The Saudi Royal Court said in a statement that Al Saud will be responsible to Prince Nawaf, appointed chief of domestic intelligence in August 2001.

 

FBI WARNS OF AL QAEDA USING SAUDI PASSPORTS

FBI Warns of Al Qaeda Using Saudi Passports
From LA Times Wire Reports
July 3, 2003

The Al Qaeda terrorist network, whose operatives have used fraudulently obtained passports for international travel, has acquired stolen blank Saudi passports, the FBI said. The FBI said the unissued Saudi passports are authentic and have key security features that allow them to pass routine examination.

"Numerous Al Qaeda terrorists have also carried Saudi passports issued in the holy capital, another term for the city of Mecca," the FBI said. It said past bulletins have noted Al Qaeda's use of altered or fraudulent Colombian identification.

 

SAUDI CHARITY DENIES US CHARGES OF TERROR LINKS

Saudi Charity Denies U.S. Charges of Terror Links
By Dominic Evans
July 1, 2003

RIYADH (Reuters) - A top Saudi charity, accused by Washington of international terror links, has denied any militant connections but said it has shut down some overseas offices to focus on tackling domestic poverty.

Al-Haramain Foundation director Sheikh Aqil al-Aqil said his organization, which raises about 200 million riyals ($53 million) a year, promoted moderation and had distanced itself from violent groups when it was established 10 years ago.

"We set up this institution to preach Islam peacefully. It's very strange that we are described as terrorist," Aqil said in an interview late on Monday. "Maybe there was a mistake. We have absolutely no inclination to violence."

In March last year the State Department listed Al-Haramain's offices in Bosnia and Somalia as "terrorist organizations." A U.S. Treasury official told a congressional hearing in Washington last week Saudi Arabia had shut down 10 of the charity's offices overseas after the May 12 suicide bombings in Riyadh and that its board of directors was purged.

Saudi Arabia has come under increasing U.S. pressure to clamp down on any support or funding inside the kingdom for militant groups after the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, carried out by mainly Saudi hijackers.

Al-Haramain, which has provided aid to Muslims around the world for a decade, has always mixed its relief work with a program to promote Saudi Arabia's austere Wahhabi Islam.

It says it has provided assistance and food to Muslims in East Africa, the Balkans, Chechnya and several Asian countries. It has also built 1,300 mosques, sponsored 3,000 preachers, and produced 20 million religious pamphlets.

Aqil said it had traditionally focused 70 percent of its spending abroad, but was switching attention to domestic needs in response to "the wish of the government" and poverty caused by rapid population growth in the oil producing kingdom.

He said it was shutting offices in Bosnia, Somalia, Pakistan, Tanzania, Kosovo, Indonesia, Kenya and Ethiopia, blaming the closure on the behavior of host governments.

"These countries cooperate with America," he said. "They always accused us, inspected us, raided us. It disturbed us."

An adviser to Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler Crown Prince Abdullah said in Washington last month that Al-Haramain would shut all its offices outside the kingdom and that it would be illegal for any Saudi charity to have an office abroad.

But Aqil said Al-Haramain still had branches in Egypt, Yemen, Sudan, Mauritania, Nigeria and Bangladesh. "All the offices that are working have a legal position," he said.

Saudi government measures since September 11, 2001, had stopped the institute from public fund-raising campaigns and had also made it tighten up its accounting practices.

But though U.S. pressure had affected some corporate donations, Aqil said public support for Al-Haramain had soared: "We are like heroes in the Islamic world because America is against us."

 

124 HELD IN SAUDI ANTI-TERROR CAMPAIGN

124 Held in Saudi Anti-Terror Campaign
July 2, 2003

Authorities launched the manhunt after fatal bombings in May and an alleged plot on Mecca.
From LA Times Staff and Wire Reports

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - Saudi police have arrested 124 people in the kingdom's recent crackdown on terrorism, and some of the suspects are linked to Osama bin Laden's terrorist network, the government said Tuesday.

Saudi authorities launched extensive manhunts after May 12 bombings that killed nearly three dozen people in Riyadh, the capital, and following a June 14 raid on a terrorist cell that was allegedly planning attacks in Mecca, Islam's holiest city.

The kingdom's interior minister, Prince Nayif ibn Abdulaziz, said 124 people have been arrested. The detainees include people linked to Al Qaeda, individuals who have returned from Afghanistan, foreign nationals and at least five women, the official Saudi Press Agency quoted the prince as saying.

The minister also said security authorities have confiscated a wide range of weapons, including hundreds of explosive devices and machine guns.

Chief among those arrested is Ali Abdulrahman Said Alfagsy Ghamdi, the suspected mastermind of the Riyadh bombings. The interior minister denied reports that Ghamdi struck a deal with officials to surrender. "The noose was tightening around him. He had no alternative but to turn himself in," Nayif said.

In Washington, President Bush said Tuesday that Saudi Arabia is making strides against Al Qaeda, singling out the recent killing in the kingdom of a "major Al Qaeda operational planner and fund-raiser" known as Swift Sword.

A U.S. intelligence official said Swift Sword is Yousif Salih Fahad Ayeeri, an Al Qaeda financier. The official described him as a senior Al Qaeda figure in the kingdom, a "facilitator, fund-raiser and propagandist. He didn't conduct attacks but was a promoter of them."

 

WAHHABI STRAIN OF ISLAM FAULTED

Wahhabi Strain of Islam Faulted
Saudis' Funding Helps Foster Terror Groups, Experts Say

By John Mintz
Washington Post
June 27, 2003

In a rare congressional hearing on Saudi funding of extremism, two U.S. senators and a panel of terrorism experts said yesterday that top Saudi officials and institutions spend huge sums from the kingdom's oil wealth to promote an intolerant school of Islam embraced by al Qaeda and other terrorist groups.

"The problem we are looking at today is the state-sponsored doctrine and funding of an extremist ideology that provides the recruiting grounds, support infrastructure and monetary lifeblood to today's international terrorists," said Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), who chaired the hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee's terrorism panel.

Although administration officials have avoided suggesting that Saudi Arabia, an important U.S. ally, is the world's leading source of terrorist funding, Treasury Department general counsel David Aufhauser testified yesterday that "in many ways, [Saudi Arabia] is the epicenter" for the financing of Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network and other terrorist movements.

"We are not at war with a faith, nor with any particular sect," Aufhauser said. But he added that Islam's "severe and uncompromising" Wahhabi movement "is a very important factor to be taken into account when discussing terrorist financing."

Aufhauser added that the Saudis' largely unmonitored spending to disseminate the Wahhabi viewpoint worldwide "is a combustible compound when mixed with religious teachings in thousands of madrasahs [Islamic schools] that condemn pluralism and mark nonbelievers as enemies . . . It needs to be dealt with."

Wahhabism was founded in the 18th century by the cleric Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, who preached an austere brand of Islam that harkens to the prophet Mohammed. Historians say the modern Saudi state is led by an alliance of his followers, who handle the kingdom's religious affairs, and the royal Saud family.

Saudi Embassy officials did not respond to requests for comment yesterday evening. But in the past they and their defenders have said critics of Wahhabism exhibit an anti-Islamic bias and want to disrupt the U.S.-Saudi alliance. Saudi officials discourage the use of the term Wahhabism to describe their religious view, preferring the term Salafism.

Witnesses at the hearing did not provide many details about the Saudi religious establishment's spending practices around the world -- a problem confronted by Wahhabism's critics for years, in part because of the Saudis' traditional secrecy about their affairs.

Alex Alexiev, an expert on extremist movements and a fellow at the conservative Center for Security Policy, cited figures in Saudi government reports showing that between 1975 and 2002, the government had spent $70 billion on aid projects around the world. He said it was unclear whether this included the large sums in private donations doled out by Saudi-regulated foundations.

Saying the scale of some of these charities is immense, Alexiev quoted reports by one of the largest Saudi charities, al-Haramain, showing that each year it prints 13 million Islamic books, dispatches 3,000 proselytizers, and founds 1,100 mosques, schools and centers.

Aufhauser also mentioned al-Haramain, saying that after the recent synchronized bombings of several residential compounds in Saudi Arabia that killed 34 people, including eight Americans, Saudi officials closed 10 of the charity's offices around the world. Al-Haramain's board of directors was purged, he added, and "a significant number of prominent fundraisers" were arrested.

Saudi officials had dragged their feet for months in cracking down on al-Haramain, in part because of its influence in the highest circles of Saudi society, U.S. officials said privately. But yesterday Aufhauser said that since the May 12 suicide bombings there, Saudi officials have worked closely with the United States to clamp down on Islamic radicals.

Muslim convert Stephen Schwartz, author of "The Two Faces of Islam," a book that warns of the spread of Wahhabism, said the Saudis established and continue to finance hundreds of mosques and centers in this country, as well as some of the nation's leading Muslim activist organizations. They also control the training and appointment of many imams, he said.

"The Wahhabi presence in the United States is a foreboding one that has potentially harmful and far-reaching consequences for our nation's mosques, schools, prisons and even our military," where a number of chaplains are influenced by the movement, said Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.).